Sermon preached at St. Andrew’s Anglican Church, Lewis Center, OH.
If you would like to listen to the whole sermon, click here.
Lectionary texts: Isaiah 40:21-31, Psalm 147:1-12, 1 Corinthians 9:16-23, Mark 1:29-39.
In the name of God: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Amen.
What is the Human Condition?
Good morning, St. Andrew’s! This warmer weather feels so good that right after this service, I’m putting on my bathing suit and going out to get a tan! Today we continue with our preaching theme for this month—ministry. Last week Fr. Ron reminded us that ministry refers to work and service inside and for this church. Furthermore, he reminded us that because the Church is a living, breathing organism, Christ’s Body, and not an organization, we, being members of his Body, must act accordingly, which translates into service. Today I want to focus on one aspect of that service—leading and/or participating in small groups.
In today’s Gospel lesson, Mark tells a story from the early part of Jesus’ ministry to which we can all fully relate. Jesus has been healing the sick and casting out demons and people are flocking to him to be healed. Very early the next morning Jesus arose and withdrew to a lonely place to pray, causing Peter and his companions to hunt for him to tell him that everyone was searching for him, presumably so that he could continue to cash in on his growing popularity. Mark uses two extraordinarily strong verbs to describe Peter’s search for Jesus. One of those verbs, zeteo, means literally to crave or demand something from someone, so we can be quite certain that Jesus was making quite an impression on people to make them want to crave for something he could offer them, namely healing. It is a poignant scene, isn’t it? Who among us cannot relate to these people and their desperate search for Jesus because who among us has not been sick, broken, or hurting?
But Mark suggests that these people were seeking after Jesus for the wrong reasons, that their interest in him was more superficial than genuine. They seemed to be interested in Jesus for what he could do for them, namely his healing power, rather than in listening to his message, and Jesus apparently struggled with that. We see this in his withdrawing to pray and in his response to Peter. Mark selectively tells us of three instances in which Jesus withdrew to pray—this instance, after feeding the five thousand (Mark 6:46), and in Gethsemane (Mark 14:32-42). In each instance, Jesus was faced with the temptation of fulfilling his Messianic mission in a more attractive, less costly way. But in each instance, he gained strength through prayer, which enabled him fulfill his mission by going to the cross and dying for us so that we have the chance to live with him forever. That is why Jesus told Peter that they needed to move on to other towns so that he could preach his message of Good News to the people.
Where is God’s Grace?
Yet, it is important for us to see that Jesus did not see his healing ministry and his ultimate mission of dying for us so that we can be reconciled with God as being mutually exclusive because Mark reports next that Jesus went throughout all Galilee preaching, healing, and casting out demons. Instead, Jesus kept things in perspective, an eternal perspective. He understood that this life is transient and broken. It is but a drop of water in the comprehensive ocean of eternity. He understood that life, real life, is having a relationship with God (John 17:3), the kind of life that Isaiah talks about in our OT lesson today. Our God is an eternal God, not a finite or transient one. He created us to have a relationship with him and did what was necessary for us to live with him forever should we choose to do so.
But being God, Jesus also understood that we live in a broken world and so he went about not only urging people to develop an eternal perspective about life and enter into a life-saving relationship with God, but also healing our physical and emotional brokenness. Yet Jesus also knew the human heart and understood how easily we can go astray and pursue the lesser things. That is why he went off to pray after healing so many and that is why he told Peter that he needed move on to preach the Good News.
Where is the Application?
Things haven’t changed too much today, have they? Many of us want to know Jesus but sometimes for the wrong reasons. We are more interested in knowing Jesus for what he can potentially do for us rather than loving him for who he is, growing in our relationship with him, and becoming more like him so that when this transient life ends we can live with him forever. No, like those earlier followers of Jesus we read about in today’s Gospel lesson, we sometimes search for Jesus because we think he is some sort of cosmic Santa Claus who will grant all our wishes or can make all of our troubles disappear.
But that is a rather short sighted perspective, isn’t it, because even if he did make all our problems disappear or heal all our diseases and infirmities, what would be the ultimate result? Death. And so we who seek after Jesus would be wise to learn what he really wants from us and that is where the ministry of small group leadership and/or participation comes in.
We Christians know that in Christ, God has given himself for us in a terrible and costly act so that we can live with him forever. We also know that at Pentecost, God has poured out his Holy Spirit on us to live with us each day to guide us, lead us, and help us to become more like him. Furthermore, he has given us other means of grace to help us in developing our relationship with him—daily Bible reading, prayer, and the sacraments so that each week we can feed on him by faith with thanksgiving and bring our hurts and fears as well as our hopes and dreams to him so that he can help sustain us in this present life.
But because we humans are finite and broken, we can get it wrong and that is why we need to also participate in small groups so that when we do, we have a built-in corrective. Moreover, God did not create us to be alone (Genesis 2:18) and in the ministry of small group participation and leadership, we learn that we don’t have to be. In small groups we learn to bear each other’s burdens. We learn to share our joys and fears. We learn to pray for and with each other and play together so that the risen Christ can help us bear our burdens in this life. In small groups we learn that we do not have to go through life alone, that God loves us and gives us other faithful souls to help us in difficult times and to rejoice with us during the happy ones. We get a foretaste of God’s great love for us when we discover that our small group members love us for who we are, warts and all, and will help pick us up when we fall down.
Likewise, in small groups we learn to dare to love each other enough to correct one another if we go astray or if we develop goofy ideas about Jesus or what Scripture says so that we don’t seek him for all the wrong reasons. All this is possible because Jesus has promised that where two or three gather in his name, there he will also be. So when we gather in small groups we are confident that our Lord is there with us to help us love each other, serve each other, and grow in grace together so that we can become more like him as we navigate the rough waters of this life here on earth.
It is in the context of small groups and in humble service to each other that we really learn what it means to be a member of Christ’s Body, the Church, because we take the time and effort to help each other deal with all the stuff that life brings our way, both good and bad, under the guidance of Christ’s Holy Spirit so that we learn to trust him and love him for who he is rather than what he can do for us, and to become more like him. In other words, we learn to cope with the joys and sorrows of this life and in doing so we learn to develop an eternal perspective of life, the kind Jesus wants us ultimately to have.
We do that by reading and studying the Bible together, praying for each other, sharing our burdens and joys with one another, and holding each other accountable for our discipleship. That is Christian ministry and service at its finest, the kind of service that is reflected in Paul’s letter to the Corinthians that we heard today when he spoke of doing what was necessary to bring people to a saving faith in the Gospel of Jesus Christ. It is the kind of service that Christ ultimately manifested when he refused to succumb to the temptation of taking the easy way out and went instead to the cross so that we could live with him forever.
One of the folks in our group, John Falor, talks about how small group has helped him in his relationship with Jesus. Listen to him now [show video clip]. John talked about what small group did for him but I can attest that he serves us well too. He leads Bible study on a regular basis and his witness is powerful stuff for the rest of us. It is a wondrous and gracious thing to see how he has grown and flourished in his faith despite some very difficult circumstances in his life. My own discipleship is made stronger by witnessing his.
Next month (March 15) we are going to have a small group fair for the parish. As I have told you before, our goal is to eventually have 95% of you participate in small groups and next month’s fair will be the first step in helping achieve that goal. We will need leaders to lead these groups and if you are asked, I hope you will prayerfully consider doing so, even if you do not feel “qualified.” Even if you do not feel called to lead a group, you can still serve Christ’s Church here at St. Andrew’s by participating in one. I know that sounds like a strange way to serve, participating in a small group, but service does not always have to be dull or involve drudgery.
After all, we have a God who loved us, gave himself for us and arose from the dead so that we too might rise with him. He has promised to come again to finish the work he started and in the meantime has promised to give us the Holy Spirit, as well as each other, to help us grow in our relationship with him so that we can live with him forever. He is counting on each of us to help nurture his Body by helping each other to seek after him for all the right reasons. How could service to One like that in the context of small group ministry be dull or full of drudgery?
What about you? If you are not already a member of a small group are you willing to accept his gracious invitation and become a leader or member of one? If you are, he has promised to be with you and will give you everything you need to do the work he calls you to do so that you can enjoy life, both now and forever. That’s good news, folks, now and for all eternity.
In the name of God: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, Amen.